Politics: Ashdown's final shot at `timid' Blair

PADDY ASHDOWN took his final conference bow as Liberal Democrat leader yesterday and warned his party against cutting its ties with Labour after he quits as leader.

The thorny issue of co-operating with the Government is expected to play a key role in the contest to elect his successor, which will start in the summer.

During his speech at the party's spring conference in Edinburgh, Mr Ashdown defended the closeness by claiming it allowed his party greater influence. "We cannot do that standing on the touchline. We can only do it playing on the field," he said.

More than at any time since the earliest years of this century the party could help to decide which path Britain took. He said Tony Blair had admitted the Liberal Democrats into co-operation on constitutional reform, where Labour is virtually following an agenda set by the Liberals decades ago, and on European common foreign and defence issues. However, though the co-operation message was clear from Mr Ashdown's text, he did not emphasise it in his delivery. Many of the 1,200 delegates probably missed its significance, preferring the emotion of the farewell performance.

During his speech he repeatedly derided the Government for its "lack of ambition". Mr Ashdown cut short the standing ovation after only a couple of minutes, slipping out of a side-door marked "Exit". He formally ceases to be leader on 9 August after the result of the ballot for a successor is declared.

Mr Ashdown also reminded the party that its goals of Scottish and Welsh assemblies, fairer votes and reform of the Lords were close to being achieved. "We are embarked on a new voyage to a new political world," he said. But the Liberal Democrats' aims for education, a better health service and an era where government became servant rather than master would not be achieved unless the party had influence.

"The changes we have begun could lead to a more open, more tolerant, more liberal Britain - or they could be just another brief fluttering of hope, quickly lost through lack of ambition and a shortage of boldness in those who lead us." By far the biggest applause during the 55-minute speech was for his call for fairer voting for Westminster. Noting that Mr Blair last Friday lauded PR for the Scottish Parliament elections as a "fairer system", he went on: "Well, I say to the Prime Minister, if it's fairer for Scotland then it ought to be a fairer system for the rest of us."

Derisive of the Tories and Scottish nationalists, Mr Ashdown did not spare Mr Blair criticism, doubting his radical talk and condemning his being in thrall to media barons.

"New Labour boasts that it roars like a lion. But far too frequently it squeaks like a mouse. I do not doubt New Labour's good intentions. But I despair at their lack of ambition. They tinker at the edges, but too little really changes. We may get smaller classes for five to seven- year-olds - but only by expanding them for eight to eleven-year-olds."

Mr Ashdown elevated the party's long-held commitment to raising income tax by 1p in the pound for investment in education into a condition for Liberal Democrat support in the Scottish Parliament. Opinion polls point to the party being kingmaker after the 6 May elections.

"If you're not interested in investing more in education then don't even bother to pick up the phone," he said. He confirmed that when Malcolm Bruce, the party's Treasury spokesman, delivers his shadow Budget today, it will include a promise to increase pensions for the over-eighties by pounds 4.75 a week. He will also advocate a graduated car tax, hitting the gas-guzzlers but scrapping duty for any car of 1,600cc or under.

Liberal Democrat leadership candidates have been under strict instructions not to campaign openly. But talk around the conference bars at the weekend was almost exclusively of the succession. Though at least eight names were being discussed, there will probably be no more than four or five on the ballot paper.

The candidates will form alliances in exchange for top posts. "If everybody stands we'll look bloody stupid," one peer confided.

As well as the favourite, Charles Kennedy, the final line-up is expected to include Simon Hughes, a veteran of anti-Labour pavement politics; one of the modernisers, either Don Foster or Nick Harvey; and a sceptic of closer ties with new Labour, either Jackie Ballard or David Rendel. Nominations for the one- member- one-vote ballot will open on 11 June - one day after the European Parliament elections - and close on 28 June.

Leading article,

Review, page 3